The Best Table Tennis Booster

I’ve written a number of posts recently looking at the best table tennis equipment and I feel as though the time has come to cover boosters. Therefore, in this article, I will recommend the best table tennis booster.

There have been a number of arguments over the last few years regarding whether or not boosting is “cheating”. I believe that this a very important debate, but not one I will be covering here. To learn more about that you should listen to this excerpt from my podcast interview with USATT player and coach Samson Dubina.

What is boosting?

When I was growing up the majority of attacking table tennis players would use “speed glue” to increase the speed of their racket. Speed glue was different to basic table tennis glue because instead of simply attaching your rubbers to your blade it would also make your racket faster – for about four hours. Then it would wear off and the extra speed would be lost.

I remember having to wake up ridiculously early before morning training in order to reglue my rubbers with speed glue. Once you started it was impossible to stop as if you didn’t do it your racket would feel unbearably slow. At tournaments, you would often see hundreds of kids lining the corridors of the sports hall “gluing up” their rackets and inhaling the fumes. It probably wasn’t that good for us!

Speed glue was banned in 2008 and replaced with booster – a safer and fume-free alternative. I used speed glue for my first year at Grantham Academy (2007/08) and booster for my second (2008/09).

I don’t know the chemistry of it all but booster is simply a substance that can be used to increase the speed and spin of your racket that doesn’t include harmful chemicals. It is a clean alternative to speed glue, that was used for many years in table tennis by players of all levels.

Boosting is the act of applying table tennis booster to your rubber in order to create the desired increase in performance of the racket.

Who is boosting?

From the sounds of all, practically all of the world’s top table tennis players are boosting their rubbers. This has been confirmed by a number of different international players and coaches.

At the local level of competition boosting is probably a lot less common. Lots of relatively new players aren’t even aware of it and others are happy with the speed of their “factory-tuned” rubbers.However, when I have played in

However, when I have played in competitions and national leagues recently I have been very aware that plenty of my opponents are boosting. If you know what you are looking/listening for then it is fairly obvious if someone is boosting. When a Tenergy rubber is “clicking” loudly all around the hall everyone know that player is a booster.

The Best Table Tennis Booster

If you decide that you fancy giving boosting a try then you need to decide which table tennis booster to use. Fortunately, there is one booster that really stands out as the best on offer. I believe that the majority of table tennis players who choose to boost their rubbers use this product…

Falco Tempo Long Booster

Falco is a French table tennis company that specialises in glues and boosters. The Falco Tempo Long Booster is their flagship product and is very popular all over the world. Here’s some basic information on it…

Completely VOC-free (impossible to detect)

Last for 8-12 weeks

Comes in a 150ml container with brush attached to the lid

Best performance of any table tennis booster

Falco Tempo Long Booster will make your rubber feel significantly softer. This is why most players using traditionally hard and tacky Chinese rubbers usually choose to boost. Without boosting these rubbers, like DHS Hurricane, would be practically unusable for elite players.

If you use this booster you will notice an immediate increase in the speed of your racket. It also produces the famous “click” sound on big loops that older players will remember from the speed glue era.

The overall increase in performance by the Falco Tempo Long Booster is very impressive. You can expect up to 30% more speed, a small increase in spin, and extra control from the softening of the sponge.

Probably the best feature of this booster lies in its longevity. A month after boosting you will still be experiencing the same effects. You will probably only need to boost your rubbers 4-5 times during a year. If you change rubbers regularly you may even get away with only boosting each rubber once, when it is new.

For players that want to put some life back into their old rubbers, or second hand rubbers received from another player, this booster will definitely make them “playable” again.

Reviews

Here are a few customer reviews of the Falco Tempo Long Booster…

The best booster on the market. – mattyd1977 (Megaspin)

Adds speed and lasts at least a month. – icontek (Megaspin)

The effect lasts as long as they claim. – Umut Ozkalyoncuoglu (Tabletennis11)

Buy a booster

Considering how long each application lasts – supposedly 8-12 weeks – that is really good value. Other boosters are available, but Falco Tempo Long Booster is definitely the one you should try first.

There are also other DIY “methods” of boosting your table tennis rubbers but again I think your best bet is to start with the Falco Tempo Long Booster and try other solutions only if you don’t enjoy the results with Falco.

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